Tragic Week in Catalonia

Tragic Week (25 July-2 August 1909) was a series of violent confrontations between the Spanish Army and Catalan radicals, anarchists, socialists, and republicans, caused by the mobilization of reserve troops for a campaign against the Rif tribes in northern Morocco. 520 Catalan veterans were called up, despite having completed their active service six years before; they could not hire substitutes for the 6,000 R price, with most workers receiving less than 20 R daily. In response to this unfair practice, the socialist- and anarchist-led Solidaridad Obrera trade union in Barcelona called for a general strike in July 1909, and the army was sent to put down the unrest. The situation evolved into bloody riots and church burnings, with the anticlerical radicals accusing the Catholic Church of forming a part of the corrupt bourgeois class whose sons did not have to go to war. The Spanish Army was sent from Valencia, Zaragoza, Pamplona, and Burgos to crush the uprising, and it was put down in August. 8 policemen and soldiers had been killed and 124 wounded, while up to 150 civilians were killed; five more were executed. King Alfonso XIII of Spain, alarmed by negative reactions from both home and abroad, fired Prime Minister Antonio Maura in response to the violence.